Wildcat

Post traumatic stress disorder is a complicated thing to treat even where treatment is available and affordable. It manifests differently in different people and is frequently complicated by other types of mental health problem. Sometimes the best route to recovery is to engage with something which forces one to step up and look beyond oneself, by taking responsibility for others. That’s a big ask, however, for somebody who is already on the edge. Harry Turner is suicidal at the start of this documentary, and when he heads to Peru, he’s looking for somewhere to disappear and die. What he finds will test him to the limit, but might yet restore his appetite for life.

Harry is a former soldier, once briefly famous for being the youngest recruit serving in the British Army in Afghanistan. Like many people going into that situation, he steeled himself to deal with violence, but he was less prepared for what he would witness of the horrors visited upon the civilian population. Given an honourable discharge on account of his disintegrating mental health, he retained certain skills which enabled him to cope with life in the jungle where most outsiders do not; and he met young American Samantha Zwicker, who was there to do research as part of her PhD but was also dealing with trauma of her own, having grown up with a violent alcoholic father.

Trevor Frost and Melissa Lesh’s beautifully photographed film follows the two of them through their work with two ocelots, Khan and Keanu, both of whom have been rescued as babies and whom it is hoped can be restored to life in the wild – although that has never successfully been done before. This means that there is a measure of scientific interest in the film, especially for people with experience in wildlife rescue – but the prime focus here is on Harry’s experience of bonding with each of the cats in turn, becoming their parent figure and endeavouring to teach them the skills they will need to survive alone – everything from chasing down rodents to avoiding dangerous spiders and learning to recognise which cayman could be lunch and which cayman might eat them for lunch.

The two cats are very different, Khan sweet-natured and affectionate, Keanu keen to show the world his fierceness from when he weighs less than a kilo, though just as susceptible to having his neck scratched or his belly rubbed. The bonds come easily, but the big challenge for Harry, in due course, comes with letting Keanu go, accepting his need to be independent and trying to dissuade him from continuing their friendship. What neither he nor Sam seem aware of is that she is doing something similar with him, at first providiing love and affection, then trying to get him to stand on his own two feet. In light of her past, she’s not willing to endure, indefinitely, the ups and downs of being around somebody who intermittently plunges into despair and tries to destroy himself. She needs him to learn to fend for himself.

Watching Harry with the cats will easily charm viewers. There is lots of play, some of it perhaps a little rougher than they intended, and the training scenes mingle amusing mishaps with the joy of seeing the animals develop. The jungle photography is particularly good, not exoticising it but instead letting us explore a piece of terrain which gradually becomes familiar, and inviting us to pick out hidden details as the cats are taught to look for prey. Along the way, snippets of science are dropped in, providing contextual information so gently that viewers may not realise they’re learning. We also meet a few of the local people (that is, people who live only a couple of hours away), and observe some of the damage done by illegal logging, including the felling of a gigantic, thousand-year-old tree.

There are other things going on in Harry’s life. Back home, a much younger brother is growing up without him. His parents are pleased that he has found a calling but clearly terrified by his continuing fragility, trying to hide it in their voices. Peru does not have all the answers, but perhaps Keanu can set him on the right path. There is a lot here which others dealing with trauma will relate to, but the film casts a spell over viewers from all backgrounds, taking us back to fundamental things too easily forgotten in the jungles of the wider world.